The largest electric aircraft just flew [video] • Hacker News Board

Re: The largest electric aircraft just flew [video]

#191

Post by Toutouxc » Fri, Sep 04, 2026, 5:42 AM UTC

enquirewithin wrote: post #166

waterTanuki wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's clearly marketed for remote communities with little to no connecting infrastructure. Think Alaskan wilderness or Hawaiian island hopping. This isn't for getting from LA to Denver for skiing.

An aircraft like this can be used two or three times a day, while spending the rest of the time charging. A piston or turbine powered aircraft can run all day.

Even Ryanair turnarounds take like 30 minutes. A bit more than that and you can charge the plane comfortably. Fueling bigger planes is quite the ceremony.

Re: The largest electric aircraft just flew [video]

#192

Post by disillusioned » Fri, Sep 04, 2026, 5:59 AM UTC

_heimdall wrote: post #152

dyauspitr wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It uses aviation fuel only after the electric battery is empty. And uses the fuel to run generators, the motors are all electric.

Its hard to call that the largest electric aircraft IMO. It's electric until it can't, then its not.

Well, technically, it's always electric. Sometimes the source of that electricity is from the battery system, and sometimes it's from an onboard generator.

Re: The largest electric aircraft just flew [video]

#193

Post by Thlom » Fri, Sep 04, 2026, 5:59 AM UTC

Toutouxc wrote: post #181

dyauspitr wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless they have a whole new airport and flying experience, I don’t think a lot of people are going to fly just 125 miles. That’s less than two hours of driving. It would be 2 hours of just airport shenanigans much less the flight itself.

> 125 miles … That’s less than two hours of driving. I don’t know where you live or what you drive, but I just punched in a destination 200 km away as the crow flies, the Alps are in the way and I’m looking at five hours of driving. Also, water.

Rookie numbers. As the crow flies it's 250km between me and my old town. Used to drive back and forth a lot back in the days and it takes everything from 8 hours to 10 hours depending on the route you take and whether you hit the ferries on schedule or not. Plus 30 minutes for resting and eating. Flying takes 50 minutes in a propeller airplane + travel to and from airports and airport shenanigans (not too bad at these small airports). If you take the morning flight you'll be in town by the time people start showing up for work. If you drive you'll be in town by the time people start leaving work.

Re: The largest electric aircraft just flew [video]

#194

Post by Toutouxc » Fri, Sep 04, 2026, 6:09 AM UTC

dghlsakjg wrote: post #183

jacquesm wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't convert between kWh and kW. 100 kWh = 6 MW for one minute... so there is plenty of power if the flight is short enough. They said the plane has 4 Tesla's worth of battery power, let's assume they are 80KWh packs then that's 320kWh that they could use for a short flight. That's a fair amount of juice, they definitely won't be flying long in a 25 ton aircraft without starting up the auxiliary motor but I have…

The specific claim from the company is that the entire 27 min flight was done with $5 worth of power using an all electric power system with a power output exceeding one megawatt. https://www.heartaerospace.com/newsroom/heart-aerospace-comp... I still think it is an amazing achievement. I just don’t see how they were able to get it done on $5 worth of power, or they just quoted the wrong price.

I still don’t see what the problem is. The entire flight was likely just a few patterns and your earlier figure of 100 kWh (let’s assume they get their electricity for cheap) is already a serious amount of energy. It takes 100 kWh of energy to lift a 10.4ton object by about 3.2 km, so we’re obviously in the same ballpark for the maiden flight, and the rest is just drag. For drag, I’ll approximate the plane fuselage as two EVs that I drive. A 737 has a lower drag coefficient than my car, but a plane also has wings, so let’s say that evens out. Out of that 100 kWh, we probably only needed like a half for pure altitude, so we have 50 kWh for drag. An EV can sustain 200 km/h with about 60 kW of power, so let’s say 120 kW for the plane, and the flight was less than half an hour. Also, the plane got to convert all the potential energy back to kinetic energy on descent, so that was “free”.

Again, I believe that the napkin math checks out.

Re: The largest electric aircraft just flew [video]

#195

Post by IrishTechie » Fri, Sep 04, 2026, 6:11 AM UTC

giancarlostoro wrote: post #182

luma wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hybrid after the first 125 miles, total range 500 miles. Their problem is diversions - an incident at the destination airport may mean an passenger aircraft may need to land at an airport which could be a couple hundred miles away. The hybrid powerplant throws the fuel efficiency numbers off so goal is not to run it unless needed, but they could not get certification without it.

Honestly, I'd feel better knowing it has a reserve system in case there's any issues, even if the batteries have more than enough power, beats having it and never using it, than needing it and suffering as a result.

Do current aircraft have a backup in-case their fuel tanks run dry?

Re: The largest electric aircraft just flew [video]

#196

Post by ben-schaaf » Fri, Sep 04, 2026, 6:29 AM UTC

IrishTechie wrote: post #195

giancarlostoro wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly, I'd feel better knowing it has a reserve system in case there's any issues, even if the batteries have more than enough power, beats having it and never using it, than needing it and suffering as a result.

Do current aircraft have a backup in-case their fuel tanks run dry?

There's reserve tanks or more generally reserve fuel for emergencies. Other than that there's no propulsion backup for when the fuel runs out, instead redundancy comes from multiple independent fuel tanks.

Re: The largest electric aircraft just flew [video]

#197

Post by ddlsmurf » Fri, Sep 04, 2026, 6:36 AM UTC

class3shock wrote: post #155

Doing some math. Regional jets get somewhere around 45.9 seat miles per gallon (1). So 30 seats, going 125 miles would take around 80 gallons of jet fuel. This is likely low because all the jets listed are bigger and likely flying longer flights that are more efficient but just go with it. Jet fuel has a specific energy of 12 kwh/kg and a density of 6.7 lb/gal (2). So 80 gallons of jet fuel is 536 lb, or 243 kg, and…

Yes, it doesn't even make sense to make electric trucks, let alone airplanes. Or they'd be mostly battery.

Re: The largest electric aircraft just flew [video]

#198

Post by alkonaut » Fri, Sep 04, 2026, 6:40 AM UTC

infotainment wrote: post #81

QuantumNoodle wrote: post #32

These kind of startup excite me. More so than the "next killer app" or "look what we shoved AI into." Cheap electric transportation can finally offset USA's lacking rail commutes and attack Europe's short flight market (which is already cheap). Now we need bigger planes or more frequent planes and the next startup to solve the energy needs.

> Cheap electric transportation can finally offset USA's lacking rail commutes I'm not sure how building an electric aircraft would help with this. Are people going to suddenly switch to commuting by plane? Fixing America's commute problem is primarily an urban planning one (ie, putting all the homes nowhere near anything) and not an insufficient-electric-aircraft one.

I don't think it's the daily work commute being solved. More weekly meeting in Cleveland for someone who works in Chicago. Which today is a 5h one way drive and a hotel stay.

Re: The largest electric aircraft just flew [video]

#199

Post by zxexz » Fri, Sep 04, 2026, 6:46 AM UTC

dyauspitr wrote: post #164

luma wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hybrid after the first 125 miles, total range 500 miles. Their problem is diversions - an incident at the destination airport may mean an passenger aircraft may need to land at an airport which could be a couple hundred miles away. The hybrid powerplant throws the fuel efficiency numbers off so goal is not to run it unless needed, but they could not get certification without it.

Unless they have a whole new airport and flying experience, I don’t think a lot of people are going to fly just 125 miles. That’s less than two hours of driving. It would be 2 hours of just airport shenanigans much less the flight itself.

Depending on the cost, and availability, 125 miles gets you within easy public transit range of NYC from Boston.

Now, of course, most of the hassle of getting to NYC from Boston is transit to and from the airport. And of course, transit from JFK, Laguardia, etc into the city.

There are at least 5 capable airports/airstrips closer to me than Logan or T.F. Green. Only one of them, Worcester, offers NYC flights. Worcester is almost an hour from me on average, and a bit more expensive. It’s an hour from takeoff to landing (I’ve arrived 10 minutes before takeoff, at the PARKING LOT many times without it being an issue).

If they can get this in and out of even smaller airports, like in Stow, MA, which is beyond capable, it will be a gamechanger.

Re: The largest electric aircraft just flew [video]

#200

Post by dmitrygr » Fri, Sep 04, 2026, 6:47 AM UTC

IrishTechie wrote: post #195

giancarlostoro wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly, I'd feel better knowing it has a reserve system in case there's any issues, even if the batteries have more than enough power, beats having it and never using it, than needing it and suffering as a result.

Do current aircraft have a backup in-case their fuel tanks run dry?

Current aircraft have * MULTIPLE HOURS* of fuel tanks. Compared to dozens of minutes of battery that this thing has.